Fences

(from Within My Illusions)

it was always meant to be temporary.
intended to be removed and replaced 
by something with more substance.

the pliant green wire
was barely strong enough
to support the weight of the canyon.
vines crept up and over
until the fence bowed in places
that would make a good entry point
for something larger than I would choose 
to invite in. 

there were times when Snowball disappeared 
for just a few minutes longer than usual,
and I couldn’t help but wonder
if the time had come 
when she’d discovered that
the limits of the boundary 
were only in her mind. 

the new fence is just what I asked for.

and yet, 
there is that part of me.

the part that longs to go back 
to the one day
when there was no divide,

the day when all I could see
was a faint impression of the old fence,
the new one still in pieces on the ground.

the day I stood in the middle,
savoring the limbo
between old and new.

the day I walked to the edge
of an artificial border,
feeling for a moment 
that there was no separation 
between the pebbled ground where I stood
and the wilderness that surrounded me.